Indigenous Astrology

April 2, 2013

California Indians knew, unequivocally, that their lifelines as humans lay in the cycles of the land. Events were timed with the coming and going of animals and the ripening of culturally important plants. This synchrony was a constant reminder that human destiny and nonhuman life were intimately intertwined. Even the conception of a baby might be planned around specific seasons marked by animal births and the sprouting of plants. The most favorable time for Miwok woman to have a child was between the months of March and June because, as a Southern Sierra Miwok man explained to a Belgium Argonaut, “[i]t is when the Spirit gives existence to everything, that the ‘Ohha (woman) should give existence.” He further commented that during these months, “he [the sun] is superior in his turn, makes every-thing grow, the birds in the air, terrestrial animals, and plants.” (Anderson, M. Kat Tending the Wild University of California Press 2005: 60)